I mean, Alex Afrasiabi (Director), Ion Hazzikostas and Brian Holinka (designers), they all gave interviews in WoD about why flying was bad for the game.
Guess who the Lead World Designer was for Cataclysm, the expansion that handed all of Azeroth the ability to fly… Alex Afrasiabi. Guess who was heavily promoted from Lead to Director? Yep. You guessed it. Guess who the GAME designer was for Cataclysm? Ion Hazzikostas. Helped implement open world flying.
Guess who did Additional Design for Mists of Pandaria, the expansion that gave us two different kinds of flying, end game and Pandaren dragons? Alex Afrasiabi. Guess who was also a Game designer for Mists? Ion Hazzikostas. So my question is this:
If regular flying was a detriment to the game, why would the two people most vocal about it in WoD put it in Cataclysm and Mists (2 versions no less) rather than expressing their dismay for open world flight and forever leave it relegated to Outland and Northrend? None of us cared til Cataclysm when we could finally fly everywhere. Kinda makes you wonder how the team that GAVE us steady flight 13 years ago would now support gating it. End game at level cap for gold was working just fine for the 4 years prior.
Because they disliked how flying completely depreciated the world. Cataclysm and MOP both had a problem where people were cooped up in their home cities.
WOD was functionally the first part of a two expansion software update that ultimately ‘fixed’ the problem.
Modern day WoW is just being plagued by whoever is still butthurt about flying and squirreling away what is now an accessibility option- non-fast flying- behind an achievement that requires you complete most of the world content. Absolutely insane.
I liked when Cataclysm finally brought “Steady Flight” as it’s now called to the Old World. I personally don’t know how Mists of Pandaria, Warlords of Draenor, Legion or Battle for Azeroth played as I quit during Cataclysm when MoP was announced. I finally did go back and complete the Pathfinder for BFA to have flight for that during Shadowlands because you still needed it, and I had many alternate characters to level.
Times changed for me during Dragon Flight which made “SF” a better choice for me over “Sky Riding” as it’s now called. I had finger amputations and no choice until they introduced “SF” in a pathfinder mode of which by time it came around I had done most everything needed.
I’m not opposed to pathfinder for certain things but as someone that enjoys doing content, I’d rather had to unlock “SR” instead of trying to push through and miss content / story to get back a flight that is much easier for me because of my hand disability. I am not personally opposed to either flight mode, just one is more helpful in certain situations, and I find that “SF” is something I use way more than “SR”.
It was nice they had a mode on some quests where the game “SF” you instead of “SR”. Otherwise, I used my ground mount up until zone 3, 1st quest hub and then it became ridiculous with all the different height changes, and I skipped content to complete the main story quest to get it back.
To me at least Blizzard was insensitive to a person with a disability by locking an accessibility issue behind the pathfinder.
Every time I use garisson hearth, it automaticaly switchs to dragonriding from regular flying so I just love stepping out of town hall and trying to make a short flight to my banker or AH, and blasting off into outer space instead and overshooting my destination by 6 miles or so, and cursing dragonriding the whole time I have to circle back around and crash land into the place I wanted to go.
I wish dragonriding never happened and hope one day they give us each a choice, to pick one type of flight to be attached to account and you keep that permanently.
Oh, I use it all the time, even without the need of a macro But not everyone even looks at the skyriding buttons except for the spacebar to help you climb higher, the 2 speed boosts, and the 3 free vigor refills. I’ve still yet to figure out how to use the Bronze timelock thing though
Given the fact we can do skyriding immediately, they should just remove pathfinder and leave old riding open for those with physical limitations or motion sickness etc. There’s literally no point in not having it and I’m not sure why it’s locked behind pathfinding anymore.
Most people I have talked to and myself included just don’t like using it period. I like regular flying much more because I’m lazy and sometimes i like to afk fly to places and not have to play a minigame as a form of travel.
I vastly prefer skyriding because it’s so fast and it’s fun to zoom around, but I get not everyone is into it. Hence why both options should be open right away, there’s no logical reason not to have old flying open when skyriding is.
and its NONE of that attentionseekers business…Ion himself said steady flight is there in part for those who just dont like skyriding…
https://youtu.be/ciYoLxIXxak?t=2170
Ion H: “some folks, for accessibility reasons, personal preference reasons, maybe you just like being able to afk in midair…dragonriding isn’t your favorite, we dont want to take anything away.”
trolls like that one will just have to COPE with reality here
But yet lock it behind a pathfinder and make those that have any of the listed jump through hoops while those that don’t have any of these issues are able to do it from the start. To me it’s insensitive statement even though he is saying we understand your plight.
So, they need to either make “Steady Flight” available from day 1 like “Sky Riding” or lock both and make people ground pound it. I prefer option 1, and unlock a cosmetic, mount, or pet when you get pathfinder completed.
yeah, its kinda an admission of guilt when Ion literally says steady flight is there for accessibility for lesser abled players…then turns around and make THEM ONLY have to work to get their version of flight.
The man seems to enjoy being the villian every chance he gets for some reason.
There’s no crying involved. Simply asking a question. I don’t mind the “new” pathfinder. In fact, PF is in the best place it has every been. I had early access on 8/22 and just randomly unlocked it on 8/25 while doing the quests to unlock the Earthen. Had you read the original post, your response might have had some actual substance.
I’ve never understood their grudge against certain player demographics, especially since our money is just as green as anyone else. If you’re correct that the pathfinder requirement is done out of spite (which I agree is plausible), that’s a very unprofessional and counter productive way to run a multi billion dollar company. Pathfinder needs to be removed now, and forevermore.
Oh but it certainly does exist for players who cannot tolerate Skyriding for many reasons. WE cannot fly without doing Pathfinder, and we cannot use Skywriting to help us complete Pathfinder. See the circular problem there?
Also, this is NOT remove Pathfinder - it only needs to be done to be able to fly using Steadyflight, while the ability to use Skyriding (dragon flight) is not locked behind a Pathfinder achievement.
But not everyone even looks at the skyriding buttons except for the spacebar to help you climb higher, the 2 speed boosts, and the 3 free vigor refills. I’ve still yet to figure out how to use the Bronze timelock thing though 